A few weeks back I bought a jar of mulberry Oligoo jam … I have no idea what they put in there except from the two berries I found … silicone gel? The texture and viscosity was that of Vinyl glue … therefor I called it Oligoo and not Oligo … it’s goo-ee, glue-ee but taste is ok … it’s quite expensive for a Taiwan made jam and the contents it has … a real money spinner, people like Oligoo … :s 
I went through a couple jars of that this summer. It was hard to spread on toast because it would stick to the knife, and it was hard to work with in general. Whatever they used for thickening, it was not the normal pectin/gelatin that 99.9% of others use in jams.
The mulberry jam I bought tasted fine, and it had a lot of berries in it. I ended up using half of it in shakes because I got tired of trying to spread the damn stuff with a knife.
The texture was about the same as O-ah-jien (oyster pancake). You know how you try to take a bite, and your chopstick gets followed by half your O-ah-jien? It was the same with this jam.
Uro, can I get a viscosity reading on this one?
Oligooo is awful stuff. Try Chien Jiah Juang’s “Natural Mulberry Juice Jam” from most organic shops. Delicious.
I’ve been trying to find tropical fruit jam made by a group of young Taiwanese entrepeuners but haven’t seen it. Supposed to be very good.
Just read the ingredients list of mulberry oligoo … jam should have fruit, thickener, sugar (not always), water (if needed) … this has twenty or so ingredients …
Oligo- is a prefix that means “a few” . In this case, it refers to oligosaccharides, which are partially broken down starch molecules.
They’re widely used as a gelling agent and thickener.
Starches are long chains of glucose molecules. Oligosaccharides are made by using enzymes to digest the starch into smaller chains, fragmenting it. as it becomes more fragmented, it becomes more soluble and changes taste and viscosity. Depending on how small they chop the starch up, it may be slightly sweet as well. Once you chop the starch up into bits that are two glucose molecules long, you end up with maltose. Chop it up all the way, and you’re left with pure glucose.
Oligosaccharides are made from cereal starches, like corn or rice, especially waste corn and rice from poor crops or broken grains from mills. There are some health issues with overuse of oligosaccharides, including exacerbating diabetes. Examples are maltodextrin with from 5 to 20 sugars, and corn syrup with normally 20 to 30 sugars. There are nearly no bulk sources of oligosaccharides in nature, but some are found in some vegetables. Small amounts of differently linked oligosaccharides, the galactosaccharides, are found in beans, and cannot be properly digested by humans, hence providing food for gut bacteria and making farts.
So its the same “oligo” from “oligarchy”?
I have a jam related question though… Why is jam called jam if its not made with oranges? Orange jam= marmalade. The same thing made with crab apples becomes crab apple jelly.
I’m in a world of confusion.
I know of five words that people use for jams, which vary according to fruit content, amount of sugar added, and place used (left or right of the Atlantic).
marmalade
jam
conserve
jelly
compote (can’t find the damn circonflex: should be ^o)
none of them should properly contain any of that artificial oligo rubbish. and nor, for that matter, should MILK. how the hell do the Taiwan people drink milk with oligo added? It tastes like oily crap.
confiture …
Sorry, my Chinese is bad … the list was the ‘can be used for’ list …
[quote]confiture[/quote] true, but I’ve never seen that in English. :lick:
[quote]con·fi·ture (knf-chr)
n.
A confection, preserve, or jam.
[French, from Old French, from confit, confection; see comfit.]
confiture [ˈkɒnfɪˌtjʊə]
n
(Cookery) a confection, preserve of fruit, etc.
[from French, from Old French confire to prepare, from Latin conficere to produce; see confect][/quote]
OK, I believe you, but I’ve still never seen it in English. You can add it to the list now if you want.
[quote=“Mucha Man”]Oligooo is awful stuff. Try Chien Jiah Juang’s “Natural Mulberry Juice Jam” from most organic shops. Delicious.
I’ve been trying to find tropical fruit jam made by a group of young Taiwanese entrepeuners but haven’t seen it. Supposed to be very good.[/quote]
Ditto. good stuff…
Have you found the tropical fruit jam? Where?